Thursday, January 8, 2009

The Nifty Fifty or My favorite basketball lens

After spending 15 hrs hand holding a MarkIIN with a 70-200mm f2.8 at a recent basketball tournament, I remembered that I had packed my 50mm 1.8 or as it's sometimes called the nifty fifty. This little beauty is the least expensive lens I own and one of the sharpest. I love my little nifty fifty and it's the perfect under the basket bball lens. I like to use it shooting low and close. It's long enough not to distort at the edges like my 17-35 zoom (I hate that lens) but wide enough even on a 1.3 crop body to get everything in the frame without cutting off hands. Here are a few shots from the second 15 hr day of last weeks tournament. I was right on the baseline close to the corner or almost under the basket. Cropping in isn't a problem when you're shooting at ISO 250, but most of these are not cropped in that far and the last one is full frame no cropping. You can click on any image to see it full size, use your back button to get back to the blog.


Lens (mm): 50
ISO: 250
Aperture: 2.8
Shutter: 1/250


Lens (mm): 50
ISO: 250
Aperture: 2.8
Shutter: 1/250

Lens (mm): 50
ISO: 250
Aperture: 3.2
Shutter: 1/250

Lens (mm): 50
ISO: 250
Aperture: 3.2
Shutter: 1/250

The difference in f-stops was a mistake, I really have to remember to tape both wheels down.

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